


Color Me, So I Won't Lose Myself

by AStarlightMonbebe



Series: One Shots [5]
Category: Stray Kids (Band)
Genre: Angst, Day6 colors, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Late night writing sorry, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-03
Updated: 2018-03-03
Packaged: 2019-03-26 08:02:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,304
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13853463
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AStarlightMonbebe/pseuds/AStarlightMonbebe
Summary: Hi, Mom, I’m sorry.Life was about death.  You lived until you died, you fought until you couldn’t, and eventually you laid flat on your back and watched the endless universe above you, knowing you couldn’t win against a force as endless as that.And then Seo Changbin met Lee Felix.





	Color Me, So I Won't Lose Myself

**Author's Note:**

> Hello~I wrote this at night while looping Day6 Colors and it just happened. It's an angsty, sad piece. I'm sorry Changlix :(

_ Hi, Mom, I’m sorry. _

Life was about death.  You lived until you died, you fought until you couldn’t, and eventually you laid flat on your back and watched the endless universe above you, knowing you couldn’t win against a force as endless as that.

Changbin had never wanted to win.  He had just wanted to fight every single minute of his life, to use it as if it was his, and his only.  Nobody would hold his life in their hands.  The ticking clock on his arm was his countdown and no one else’s.

Most people lived to be at least twenty.  Most lived well past fifty, or if they didn’t, at least to their middle ages.  Enough to set up a life and a legacy for those left behind.  Changbin wasn’t most people.  The numbers on his wrist, above the ticking clock, 00:06:02:03:22:04:10.  Six months, two weeks, three days, twenty two hours, four minutes, and ten seconds until he died.

He was eighteen years old, a highschool dropout, and he rapped for a living.  Nothing particularly bad, nothing particularly good.  Just a runaway kid from parents who had long since stopped caring with an acquaintance or two because he didn’t  _ do _ friends, a backpack that held his life possessions, and a will to live those last six months to the most.

If he thought about it, Changbin didn’t care that he was going to die.  He didn’t think about how it would happen, suicide, an accident, heroically-the last one being ridiculous; he cared for no one but himself-he only cared that his short and fiery life would end so soon.  It wasn’t enough time to fulfill the idol dreams he’d had as a child, to make a name for himself, to see as much as he wanted to.  Then again, to do that he’d have to be immortal.

So, in the end, Changbin only hoped he would die peaceful.  Being happy wasn’t a requirement, but being at ease with death was.  He didn’t count on anyone missing him, he doubted there would be a soul that would.  He was fine with that.  He didn’t need anybody, the only reason he had gotten this far was surviving on his own.

Everything was going fine.  No complications, nobody, everything simplistic perfection to him.  

_ I wasn’t good enough. _

Lee Felix was warm, with a big smile, and a boyish face.  The first time Changbin saw him was in an alleyway, and he would never forget the look on Felix’s face as he took in the sight of Changbin, dripping blood all over the place.  Changbin would never forget the way he had grabbed him and dragged him home, allowed him to cry on his shoulder as he patched his wounds.

To his credit, Felix hadn’t said anything about the clock, though Changbin was sure he had noticed it.  How could you not?  It was right there, glaring and black against the pale skin of his inner wrist.  Changbin felt his fingers brush against the skin, pausing for a slight moment, before continuing to bind his arm.  The bandages covered the clock and the numbers entirely, and Changbin was grateful for that.

He left in the morning, leaving nothing except for a twenty dollar bill behind.  He barely had any money, but he wanted to thank Felix for what he had done.  Unfortunately, Changbin couldn’t stick around any longer, no matter how much that upset Felix.  He didn’t let people see him vulnerable, didn’t let them see him cry, and he planned to stay far away from the one person that had seen both.

His clock read 00:05:04:06:11:15:25 when he left, and he went to the nearest tattoo parlor and asked for an inscription just above the numbers.  It was painful, difficult, long, but the finished product read;  _ I will live until I die.   _ Changbin smiled.  It was something else to remind him that he controlled more of his life than the ticking hands did.

_ I don’t know if you’ll miss me. _

The second time Changbin saw Felix was two months later, in the rain, and Felix gave him his umbrella before dashing away.  Changbin watched him go, rain falling in front of his eyes, pattering against the thin pink material the umbrella was made of.  He couldn’t help thinking that it was a very Felix color, and a very Felix thing to have.  His hand tightened around the handle as he watched the boy disappear around the corner, dark blue bomber flapping behind him.

_ Idiot.  He’s going to get soaked.   _ He didn’t want to hunt Felix down, but he did, passing him the umbrella over the counter of the record shop where he worked.  Instead of leaving immediately, Changbin lingered, fingers brushing the dusty records, picking them up and examining them.  He told Felix they were nice, but when he turned around the boy looked like he was hardly paying attention.

He bought a random record, sliding it across the register and asking how much it was.  Felix looked up, eyebrows furrowing.  Changbin repeated the question, and then he noticed the slim pieces of metal he had assumed were some sort of headphones in Felix’s ears.  Felix noticed him looking, tapping them and nodding.

It was then that Changbin realized in the short moments they had spent together, Felix had never spoken a word.  It was a shame.  He wanted to know how Felix’s voice sounded.  It was a thought that was new to him, a thought about someone that wasn’t himself and his well being.  Changbin wasn’t used to being cared about, and he wasn’t used to caring about others.  Somehow, Lee Felix denied both those standards.

_ Actually, I’m sure you won’t.  I was a pretty cruddy son, right? _

The first time Felix kissed him, his clock read 00:02:10:05:03:12:43, and Felix traced the letters he had tattooed above them over and over again, until his touch was a part of Changbin himself.  He lay his head on Changbin’s lap and they watched the stars until they were only dizzying blurs.

_ Do you think there is a universe beyond ours?   _ Felix signed, and Changbin thought about it, before signing back;  _ I think that universes don’t matter in the long run.  We are on this earth, in this lifetime, and even if there is something endless above us, we ourselves are never going to be forever.  So we live as we do and we die as we do and I could care less about whatever universe above our heads. _

_ You think about that a lot, don’t you?   _ Felix had told him in return, and Changbin didn’t bother to correct him, he only kissed him again.  They kissed until the sun rose and the sky was streaked with pink and gold, and Felix fell asleep against Changbin.  It was like he was holding an angel in his grasp, the sun bathing his face in an ethereal light.

Changbin promised he would do whatever it took to protect this heavenly being.

_ I should have written more.  I should have told you I loved you.  _

Felix never showed him his clock.  He had seen Changbin’s enough times, and Changbin had no problem casually mentioning it.  He didn’t care about life and death, he had made that clear enough.  He never noticed how quiet Felix got when he mentioned it either, the slight twist of pain in his features as Changbin joked about the short amount of time he had left.

In the short time he had known Felix, Changbin had given up on his earlier thoughts.  Caring for someone was cruddy, but the very sight of him made Changbin grow warm and happy.  He didn’t remember a time that he had been so purely happy, except for being around Felix.  So Changbin held his hand, and traced the shape of his collarbone, and Felix was him and Changbin was Felix.

He hadn’t realized how much Felix cared.  He hadn’t realized that until Felix left and didn’t come back, because his clock was even shorter than Changbin’s, and Changbin had never realized-

He reread the note Felix had left so many times that it became barely legible from the tear stains and tears.  It was like his heart was ripping apart, tearing him to shreds.  His fault, his issue, his fault...Felix had been angry that Changbin was going to die, that he was practically rubbing it in his face.

_ Maybe I don’t want to think about the fact that my boyfriend is going to die soon!   _ He remembered Felix snapping angrily, the one time he had spoken in front of Changbin, and his voice was beautiful, it was so so beautiful, and Changbin was sorry...he was sorry. 

It was the first time Felix had called him his boyfriend.

_ I should have done a lot of things. _

00:00:04:02:09:01:04.  Changbin didn’t know how he was going to survive four more weeks, four more weeks of a life without Felix, a life without his angel, his color.  Felix was the soft pink red to his darkening gray, the color that kept him alive and breathing.  Changbin missed him.  He missed him so much he could barely move.

Nobody knew.  Nobody cared.  Changbin could hardly stay a minute at the funeral before one of Felix’s friends had spotted him, and he had run.  Far away, away from the crowds and people judging him.  He ran until he fell and then he sobbed and sobbed, because he had fallen in love with Lee Felix in the span of four months and he had lost him in less than a second.

The boy who had turned his world upside down.  The boy who had showed him there was more to life than just living, and death wasn’t what you should define yourself by, because there was more than that.  There were stars and the endless universe surrounding them, and there was coffee at midnight, the feel of Felix’s hand, an old album covered in must that they played even though Felix couldn’t hear a word, he said he could listen just by watching Changbin’s expressions.

The one person who had looked at Changbin and seen him, who had realized that beyond the cold exterior there was a human who hurt and cried and collapsed, and he had done all those things and more in front of Felix.  The one person who hadn’t run away when it got difficult, but-

But he had still left.  Just like everyone else, he had left, and Changbin was alone and falling backwards into the same thoughts that had held him before.  In the end, it all came back to death, because that’s where everyone went, and it was the one place they couldn’t return from.  

Crying hurt, it hurt his chest so much he could hardly breathe, and yet, he couldn’t stop.  He couldn’t stop the sadness from overtaking and overcoming the will he had left.

_ I met an angel, and I held his hand, but I let go.  Did you know that, mom?  _

The numbers read 00:00:00:00:00:11:12:32 when he stood up and left, leaving a note behind for whoever bothered to look for one.  It had been over two years since he had seen his mother or his father, and he was sorry to his mother, but not to his father.  He would never be sorry to his father.

He was sorry to the people that could have been his friends if he had let them get close.  He was sorry that he had been born with a clock and numbers that weren’t nearly as long as they should be.

He was sorry that Felix had met him.  His father had called him bad luck, said he killed anything that held even a hint of beauty or goodness because he was dark, he was evil, he was nothing.

Changbin had lived his life enough, he decided.  He was tired of living it to its fullest, he was tired of moving forward even though his legs told him to stop.  He was tired of crying pathetically like the pathetic and worthless person he was.

Kids had never been nice to him.  He had been the freak who was going to die before all of them, so they had used their stupid kid logic and told him that it didn’t matter what they did to him, he was going to die soon anyways.  To them, being a teenager had been soon, but to Changbin it felt like a million years.  

There had been a time he had tried to burn his tattoo away, ending in agonizing pain and scars that never healed.  He had tried to cut it away, mutilate it, but when the pain had faded it always remained intact.  A mockery.

The world had rejected him.  Changbin had figured that out a while ago, but during his time with Felix, a part of him had forgotten and shoved that deep down where he couldn’t think about it.  Because Felix accepted him, held him and didn’t treat him like the trash he had been accustomed to feeling like.

Forgetting had been nice for a short while, but Changbin couldn’t stop it all from coming back.  Pain that swept over him in waves.  He was done.  He was over.  He left the small place he called his home with no intention of returning.

He never made it past the sidewalk.

_ I think I’ll see him soon.  I miss you, I love you. _

Seo Changbin was born on  August 11th, and he turned nineteen the moment his numbers turned to 00:00:00:00:00:00:00.

_ Your son, Changbin. _

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading.  
> This is my first published work in the Stray Kids fandom (I have several but I'm shy and they're not done), so I hope you enjoyed.


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